How to partition and use OMV system disk for user data

I've decided to give OMV a try with a 320 GB disk for system which was the only disk available but didn't want to waste so much space for a ~2GB installation. Have done a lot of digging and testing and finally came up with a way of using the system disk for user data as well. Basically the steps are:

1. Install omv - sda1 = root partition, sda2 - extended and sda5 -swap.
2. Install omv-extras - LVM, Flash Memory + activate Flash Memory plugin per the instructions to minimize disk IO by the OS
3. Booted with GParted Live cd and downsized the root partition sda1 to 15 GB.
4. Booted OMV and used parted to create a new partition sda3 in the free space between sda1 (root partition) and sda2 (extended partition holding the swap filesystem).
5. Used CLI command "pvcreate /dev/sda3" to create a physical volume for use with LVM (unable to do this from OMV web interface).
6. The new LVM physical volume becomes visible in OMV web interface and I was then able to use the web GUI to create a volume group and logical volumes - shares, iSCSI LUNs etc.

i cant understand......

I've decided to give OMV a try with a 320 GB disk for system which was the only disk available but didn't want to waste so much space for a ~2GB installation. Have done a lot of digging and testing and finally came up with a way of using the system disk…

can you please explain step by step.
my omv is installed in easystore h340 with 4 1 terrabytes hdd.
in the first hdd is the os, i like split the hdd, in various partion, 1 for os, 1 for swap, and te remain to use with the others 3 hdd, like one big hdd...no raid mount but i cant understanding how can do it

it is ok use usb key with 8 gb for omv os?

use only one disk to boot and to use for data is only for advanced users that know what are doing.

easy way is to use 1 disk for boot and &quot;n&quot; disk for data

Of course your boot disk can be an old IDE or SATA Disk with only a few MB, you can also use USB…

ok
Thanks for your response.
now my question is, i can us an usb key with 8gb to install omv os?
so i have after the os on usb key and the 4 hdd only for storage.....
other question is, the aspire easystore h340 have on motherboard an smi usb flash integratet, but have only 254,00mb, is to small for install omv os?

Step by step for reclaiming unused space on a large system drive

Corrected on Aug. 22. 2012
--Today
Thanks a seidler2547. Efectivily is posible to use sda3 partition on OMV only formating it.
--
We start from an OMV system running and installed on a hard drive that it could be /dev/sda and we want to use part of it as a aditional data storage unit for the system.

We stop orderly OMV, and with "gparted live" CD or USB (@ sourceforge.net):

1) reduce the size of the partition /dev/sda1 (system partition) to a reasonable size, eg 8 GiB
2) extend the size of the primary partition /dev/sda2 to full disk size.
3) move the extended partition for swap, /dev/sda5 contained in the primary /dev/sda2, from the end, to the beginning of the /dev/sda2
4) reduce the size of the primary partition /dev/sda2 just to the size of the extended partition /dev/sda5
5) create a new partition with free disk size /dev/sda3
--Today
6) format /dev/sda3 with the type ext4

I sized to 20GB for overkill in case I decided later I needed more.

Also I have done this twice and on the second go around the GPARTED format of /dev/sda3 would not mount from web interface but I resolved that by formatting from command line ... mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda3

Fact was that the physical drives I formatted with GPARTED would mount either and I had to reformat them with the same procedure from the command line to get them to mount.

OMV 2 |64 bit|

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Why to reclaim unused space on the system drive.

You make valid points but I did not want to invest extra money in a new smaller SSD. Especially since I didn't know how good OMV would turn out to be and how good the community is. The smallest drive I had on hand was a 250GB drive and currently only about 2GB is really in use. The Post I referenced suggested 8GB for size but to delay running out of room I chose to set the size to 20GB. This allows me to reclaim about 200GB which would otherwise have never been used.

You're right about what you lose if you have to reinstall. Yes I have reinstalled several times but I plan to never have to do that again. LOL So far it is working for me just as well as my plan to live forever.... seems to be working so far.

On a more serious note ... I would urge anyone planning to use a larger than needed drive and wanting to reclaim some of the space, only put stuff on the newly created partition that you would not mind losing. Something that is easy to recreate and can be backed up in another location. I would not feel bad about devoting a 32GB drive as a system drive but it hurt to use a 250GB drive

My thought is to install Virtual Box plugin and use /dev/sda3 for the virtual machines. I plan to copy those virtual machines to another location and then if I have to reinstall Virtual Box in the future I would use the backups to speed up the installation. Also do not use the partition for anything that has frequent writes ... if you are using a SSD.

As I write this I am planning to buy a small SSD when I can afford it and to see if it is possible to remove the large drive I am using. I would substitute the new small drive and attempt to restore to it from the backups I am saving which are created using the backup plugin I installed and am saving to a data drive that is not part of the Grey Hole drive pool. Do you have any thoughts on that idea?

Thanks for the input and the reason "to think out loud" as I replied ... the more I think about it the more I realize I don't want to even have to hassle with recreating the virtual machines. Next task if to price a small SSD.

OMV 2 |64 bit|

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I would say OMV is the best open-source NAS right now, and the community is awesome.
I being using OMV more than a year.
It running on my built computer.
I did tried FreeNAS, but it didn't work out, so I chose OMV.

Whether you want to use dedicated drive for your OMV or not, it depends on your wallet and preference.
No big deal.

PD: if you use 1 disk for data and boot, you easy lose your data when a problem appears, if you use separate disk, you can reinstall OMV in a new boot disk and no data is lost.

First, I totally agree w/ the above. I'd rather not use the OS disk to store data, if it can be avoided, simply because if the OS disk fails, you're going to lose the OS and data. Personally, even when I ran my NAS with other OS's... I always did it this way and never had a problem.

Second, using a USB key is fine... just flash plugin to take care of the writes, etc. I use an SSD for my OS drive, but I still have the flash plugin installed to minimize the writes on my SSD.

Not sure where you are, but here in the US... you can get 60-120gig 2.5in SATA drives on new on eBay all day long for around $30 bucks. This is what I done before I got my SSD, and frankly, if my SSD dies, I'll probably do it again (but that's another thread..)

Finally, unless you really *need* the space on the OS drive, I wouldn't consider it wasted space. When I had my old OS drive for 3-4yrs before it finally croaked, it was a 120gig drive... the OS took up around 3gigs IIRC. Considering I had about 4tb of storage... worrying about what to do with around 100gigs, seemed pointless. If I was pushing my storage needs that hard, I'd just buy bigger storage drives, rather than worry about that 100gigs on the OS drive (which is what I ultimately done when I needed more storage)... Just seemed like it was more hassle than it was worth

Air Conditioners are a lot like PC's... They work great until you open Windows.

I would say OMV is the best open-source NAS right now, and the community is awesome.
I being using OMV more than a year.
It running on my built computer.
I did tried FreeNAS, but it didn't work out, so I chose OMV.

Whether you want to use dedicated drive for your OMV or not, it depends on your wallet and preference.
No big deal.

Totally agree with you.
except I would say OMV is the best base host system, not just NAS.
I have been searching long time for the easy to use and maintain HOST system that can be a File server/NAS AND VM host. plenty of thing out there that can do that but most of them are either complicated beyond reason and/or not very easy to run and maintain.
so far I been running my OMV host for almost 3 weeks and love every moment of it.
most things I want are easy to setup and use, whole system is a breeze to get going, (grunted if you want things that are not a straight forward to setup you need to be prepared for some hands on work but still not as complicated as many other setups ) ,
and it works. nice and easy.

I'm really liking this community

To respond to replies from vl1969 and KM0201. The more time I spend in this forum the more I like the community.

I'm in Washington State USA and recently had to retire from more than 20 years doing Windows and computer hardware tech support.

I want to keep my mind active and continue learning and a friend in similar situation pointed me to OMV. Linux is new to me but it reminds me of what I used to have to do with DOS back in the Windows 3 and Windows 95 days. I got spoiled by how much the registry does in the post Windows 95 versions. Linux is more hands on than Windows which is made for people who probably should not be allowed to have a computer.

Yes I impressed with the plugins and what can be done with OMV. I have been running a Windows 2012 Standard file server and a Windows 2012RS Essential server which is the Domain controller and hosts VMs. I had a spare server case with 8 drive bays and was looking to back up some of my most important data in another location in case of a total failure of the current location. Yes there is duplication but I have seen too many catastrophic failures over the years to not be concerned. Plus OMV does seem to be just as capable in a lot of ways to do what I use my Essentials server for. The good news is that from the efforts of the developer, those who work on the plugins, anyone who contributes and the community in general OMV works and the price cannot be beat.

With regards to why I am interested in not wasting space on the system drive ... my first PC had a 120MB .... note Mega-byte hard drive and Windows 95 plus installed applications over filled it to the point I had to uninstall things in order to be able to install something else. Old space utilization training is hard to forget.

Thanks again to all who reply ... I get more things to think about it helps to increase knowledge

OMV 2 |64 bit|

Your Test Results are back: You are Granted License to Own a Computer But Your Recent Score Does Not Allow For You To Connect a Mouse and Keyboard to it.
You may study and retake the Exam ... If your score is sufficiently improved the License may be upgraded to allow for Mouse and Keyboard Connection.

You can use OMV with just a system drive and not adding an extra partition. This post shows you how to have a folder on the system drive and make it available on one of your data drives as a shared folder. You could just use a cheap usb stick as the data drive. In this example the stick would not really be used. The symlinks would redirect to the folder on the system drive.

Clarification Please

I read the post you linked to and if I understand correctly if a person did not modify his large system drive to create a partition in the free space after resizing and moving /dev/sda1, /dev/sda2, and /dev/sda5 ... they could use the plugin to store uploaded and downloaded files on the system drive. After following the steps of the plugin setup you could have a Samba share for upload and download on a media drive ... read / write operations from my Windows computer would look like they are to or from the media drive but the magic of the plugin actually moves the files to and from the system drive.

If this is true would those files be backed up with the backup plugin so they could be restored along with the system should it be necessary?

If so the unused space of the system drive could be used for a secondary storage location for important files - but if not restorable from the backup I would be reluctant to put any storage on the system drive in case I had to restore.

Einstein said just because you can do something does not mean you should do it.

I am considering reinstalling and using the plugin you mentioned or reinstalling to a smaller SSD and then I would not have to feel guilty about wasting 200GB on the under-filled drive I am currently using.

I would guess that nobody knows if the store locations on the system drive would be backed up. Probably not - because those files are not part of the operating system and there is most likely no mechanism like Windows server backup has for allowing other folders to be included in the backups.

OMV 2 |64 bit|

Your Test Results are back: You are Granted License to Own a Computer But Your Recent Score Does Not Allow For You To Connect a Mouse and Keyboard to it.
You may study and retake the Exam ... If your score is sufficiently improved the License may be upgraded to allow for Mouse and Keyboard Connection.

Yes, since the files are residing on the system drive they would be backed up with the backup plugin. With the backup plugin you need to choose exclusions that you do not want backup. There are some default exclusions (e.g. temp files) already. I could make numerous posts with different services showing how to do this. One person had asked how so I showed one method I was using. I like this for uploads and downloads because you don't have to change to a long path (e.g. /media/uuid/somefolder) to get to files your've uploaded or downloaded.

We are not discussing time dilation here. It is pretty simple and once you do it a few times you will have a good enough understanding.

You can use OMV with just a system drive and not adding an extra partition. This post shows you how to have a folder on the system drive and make it available on one of your data drives as a shared folder. You could just use a cheap usb stick as the data drive. In this example the stick would not really be used. The symlinks would redirect to the folder on the system drive.

I would suggest it become a Sticky or GUIDE which can be found easily when someone searches for How to Reclaim Unused Space on System drive.

Without the Guide I did not find mention of the plugin and its value did not jump out a me when I saw it in the list of available plugins.

The procedure I used which uses GPARTED Live does work but it predates the plugin by several years. It does what the original author claimed but the plugin approach appears to reclaim space for storage of files. Unless of course you decide you really need the partition. I believe the original author included the new partition in a Raid or Drive pool configuration. This is something I did not consider a good idea.

The original post gave me reason to learn about GPARTED which by the way resulted in several reinstalls also.

I myself will use the plugin instead using the partition idea.

Oh well I have need of the larger drive in another location anyway so I ordered a smaller drive and will be reloading yet again to the smaller drive ... Although smaller it will still be large enough for me to benefit from the plugin

OMV 2 |64 bit|

Your Test Results are back: You are Granted License to Own a Computer But Your Recent Score Does Not Allow For You To Connect a Mouse and Keyboard to it.
You may study and retake the Exam ... If your score is sufficiently improved the License may be upgraded to allow for Mouse and Keyboard Connection.